


Got Your Back

by Joanne_Lupin



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Concussions, Friendship, Gen, Lardo should show up here at some point but she hasn't made an appearance yet??? idk why??, Major Character Injury
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-16
Updated: 2018-01-16
Packaged: 2019-03-05 11:05:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13386513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joanne_Lupin/pseuds/Joanne_Lupin
Summary: i need to know a lot more about the moments after Bitty gets checked\concusseda.k.a. The SMH helps Bitty because concussions are actually a bitch.





	Got Your Back

**Author's Note:**

> 1) I wrote a post about this a long time ago and the more I think about it, the more I understand why we don't see much of Bitty until he's mostly healed, but that doesn't mean I don't wanna know what happened.
> 
> 2) I know where this is going but I'm not quite sure how to get there, so I guess I'll keep trying if people want more but this is what I've got right now.
> 
> 3) This fic doesn't get shippy, but Jack does worry about Bitty a lot more than maybe a captain should...
> 
> 4) There are descriptions of how a concussion feels in this fic, as well as a scene where a character accidentally cuts himself. Blood is mentioned. Be safe.
> 
> 5) My knowledge of concussions for this fic comes from the time I had one a few years ago. Mine was milder than Bitty's, which I've mostly just translated to the symptoms (especially memory loss) lasting longer than they did with me. (Is this fic just an alternate reality where I actually had a support system after my concussion to help me?? maybe.)
> 
> Enjoy!

There’s a gap in Eric’s memory. 

He knows— people have told him— that after the check, he lay there for a moment, stunned, before struggling to his feet. There must’ve been a huge uproar around him as his teammates dropped their gloves. He must’ve made his way off the ice. His coaches must’ve helped him off, and he must’ve seen the medic, and his team must’ve been waiting for him once he was cleared to go back to his dorm.

Logically, all of these things must have happened, but when he reaches back, he can’t actually remember them. He has vague pictures that he thinks he’s constructed from what other people have told him, but they’re not real memories.

In his internal timeline, there’s the too-bright, slow-motion memory of the hit, then the flashes he’s managed to piece together, and then a softer memory— one of Jack’s arm around him, supporting him as they walked towards the Haus. 

“My dorm’s that way…” Eric mumbled. He was trembling. Each moment slipped into the next before he could realize time was passing. It made everything feel distant and dreamlike, even the throbbing in his head.

“You’re staying at the Haus tonight, Bittle. They said we had to check on you while you slept.”

“On the couch?” 

“Of course not,” Jack reassured him. “You can sleep in my room. I can take the chair.”

“Jack—” Eric protested.

“You don’t get a say, Bittle. I’m team captain, and I’ve made my decision.”

Eric was exhausted and didn’t quite know what to say. He didn’t want the guys to worry about him too much, and he definitely didn’t want Jack beating himself up over all this. “You don’t have to do this,” he muttered. “But… thanks.”

“I told you, Bittle: I’ve got your back.”

Eric’s head was pounding horribly by the time they reach the Haus— so much so that Jack insisted on carrying him up the stairs. He didn’t let him down until they’d reached Jack’s room. Shitty appeared moments later with a bottle of Ibuprofen and a glass of water.

“Ransom and Holster went to grab you some, like, clothes and stuff. Hope that’s cool, brah,” Shitty told him.

“They didn’t have to…”

“Sure they did, Bits. We’ve got your fuckin’ back, dude.”

Eric gave him a small smile. “Thanks.”

“No prob. Rest up, brah.”

Eric took some pills and washed his face while he waited for Ransom and Holster, who arrived with the softest pair of pajamas Eric owned, plus his fuzzy socks, his throw blanket, Señor Bun, and several pillows, some of which Eric knew weren’t from his room.

“Y’all’re being too good to me…”

“We’ve got your back, Bitty,” said Ransom.

“Chyeah. I mean, you’d do the same for us,” said Holster.

“Hell, you pretty much _have_ done the same for us,” Ransom added. “Remember flu season?”

Holster nodded. “Chicken soup for _days,_ man.”

Eric managed a small chuckle, wincing when the motion of his breath made his head hurt. Ransom and Holster shared concerned, pitying looks and gave him the most delicate pats on the shoulder they could muster.

“Sleep tight, man.”

“Yeah. Get well soon.”

_X_

Eric was groggy when he woke up the next morning. It took him a little too long to figure out where he was, but when he did, he noticed that Shitty was occupying the chair Jack had been sitting in last night.

“Hey, Shitty,” Eric said as he slowly sat up. “Where’s Jack?

Shitty leapt up, tossing his book aside. “Hey, Bits! You’re up! Jack left just a bit ago to get some sleep. Told me to tell you your mom called last night; she was pretty worried when she saw the check. Jack talked to her a bit, told her you’d call once you wake up. Here, take these.” While he’d been talking, Shitty had helped Eric up, handing him some pills and a fresh glass of water. As Eric took them, he struggled to wrap his head around everything. 

“Wait… Didn’t Jack sleep last night?”

“Nah. He had to check on you, and he didn’t wanna wake you up with alarms every couple hours. We told him we could take shifts, but he pulled rank on us. Honestly, he seemed like he wouldn’t have been able to sleep, anyways. He was real worried.”

“He didn’t need to do that,” Eric mumbled.

“I’ll tell him that when he wakes up. You wanna call your mom?”

“Yeah.”

The phone call was excruciatingly long. Usually, Eric loved talking to his mama. But his head was sore and he was having a lot of trouble holding on to any one thought long enough for it to register. He reassured her that the boys were taking great care of him, and that despite the screen ban, he’d live long enough to get back to Georgia at the end of the semester. 

After the call, and after making himself somewhat presentable, Eric decided he needed to bake.

“As long as you’re feeling up to it, brah, you know I’ll never stop you from baking,” Shitty told him. “Can I keep you company?”

“Of course, Shitty. Just don’t touch anything.”

Shitty nodded and gave him a formal salute. Bitty smiled. He took the stairs carefully, as the world seemed to lurch underneath him when he moved too fast. 

They had plenty of apples in the kitchen, so apple pie, it was. Shitty talked to him as he peeled and prepped, but Bitty found he couldn’t quite keep up with both tasks at once. He felt disconnected. Fuzzy. And though Bitty knew this was normal— he may not remember what the doctors said to him last night, but he did remember their pre-season meeting about concussions— he couldn’t stop his brain from screaming at him that this was _wrong, bad, dangerous._

Shitty just keeps talking, and Bitty is trying to listen and bake at the same time, but his biological response is panic, and he’s getting overwhelmed fast, and that just makes it harder to latch on to reality, and then—

There’s red on the apples, and on his hand. Shitty leaps up to help him, and Bitty sort of snaps at him.

“No! Don’t help. I’m _fine._ ” And he must be glaring something awful, because Shitty immediately backs away.

“Sorry, brah! It’s just— that cut looks pretty nasty.”

“I’ve got it,” Bitty replies, still coldly, but trying to be calm. “Let me just clean all this up, and then… I think I’m just going back to my dorm.”

And that would be the end of it, but of course, Jack came down then, looking groggy and still too tired. 

“Bittle. What happened?”

Eric forced a bright smile and tried to hide his injured hand from Jack’s view. “Nothing! Just a little scratch. Don’t worry— I’ll clean it up!”

“Like Hell, you are,” Jack replied. “We’ve got it, right Shits?”

“Yeah, I mean— Bits, if you want to go, you can just go.”

“I can clean it up,” Bitty insisted. He was still bleeding— he should fix that. He thought about it, but when he moved his head, he forgot what he was trying to do. He picked up the knife, instead, and held it. It went in the sink. He should put it in the sink. But he needed to talk to Jack and Shitty, too. He doesn’t turn.

“Bitty,” Shitty said, gently, reaching out to take the knife. “It’s okay. We’ve got it.”

“I can—”

“Bittle.” Jack had come closer, close enough that he could see the blood on the apples, see the deep gash on Eric’s palm. “As your captain, I’m telling you to rest. And let me look at that cut.”

“…Okay.” Eric lifted his hand slowly. Jack winced.

“That looks like it needs stitches.”

“It’s fine. I cut my hands all the time when I was first learning. I can take care of it, really.”

Jack frowned, but maybe he could see that Eric was determined to retain some shred of his independence. “If it’s still bleeding in an hour, text me. That’s an order.”

Eric nodded, hating the way it made his head feel.

“Thanks for everything. I’ll see y’all later.” 

Eric rinsed his hands off at the sink, pressed a wad of paper towels hard against his hand, and left the Haus.

-o0o-

“I knew it. He’s mad at me,” Jack muttered. “I thought I was getting better with him, and then I went and messed it up.”

Shitty shook his head. “It’s not you, Jack. It’s the concussion. They said he might seem distant the next few days.”

Jack surveyed the remnants of Bittle’s abandoned pie. “He isn’t himself. He’s so… flat.”

“That’ll happen. Don’t worry too much, Jack. He just needs some time to get better.”

“I want to do something.” Jack clenched and unclenched his fists, searching for something to occupy his hands now that they’ve cleaned up the aborted pie. 

“I think he needs space for now, brah.”

“Yeah… Yeah…” 

Shitty looked him over suspiciously. “How much sleep did you end up getting, anyway?”

“Uh…”

“Go back to bed, Jack. Bits is already out, can’t afford to lose our captain now, too.”

Jack nodded. “Let me know if, uh, if anything happens.”

“Of course, Jackabelle.”

Shitty swatted a towel at Jack’s butt. Jack let out a disgruntled noise, but smiled, nonetheless.

**Author's Note:**

> My Check, Please! sideblog is fightmekentparson. My main is fifty-shadesofgay. Please talk to me.


End file.
